One's Loss is Another's Gain - What Comes with Gambling?

Types of Gambling

There are several different forms in which gambling exists. From lottery tickets to the game of roulette, it exists in every financial scale possible. Lotteries usually see people betting a single dollar in a bid to win millions. The traditional casino games like roulette and blackjack involve higher risks in terms of the amount that is gambled. There are also games that require a bit of skill and understanding like Hold ‘em Poker. It relies on the players’ ability to be conniving and their ability to read other people. Then there is also the prospect of betting on things that you have personally nothing to do with like horse races, soccer games, and even election results – basically anything that has an outcome which is not certain, people can and do bet on them.

What Motivates Gambling?

There are several reasons why people choose to take on gambling. The anticipation of the winnings and the adrenaline rush which people get, because the uncertainty of the gamble makes for an exciting experience for most of the people. Every emotion that the human being feels is based on chemicals that are being released by the brain, right? When a person is gambling, the feeling of excitement, anticipation and the rush makes for the release of those chemicals to become dependent on the activity of gambling. It essentially makes a person an addict.

Gambling is also done by many as a social activity. People head to the casino in a group of friends and make a hang-out of it.

Big Winnings

Of course there is a motivation to win big and make a lot of money. That’s what gambling is mostly associated with and it has been so for the longest time. There have been success stories about lottery winners where people have indeed won millions. Back in 2013 May, there was the winner of the largest Powerball lottery in the states, who managed to win $590 million. The eighty-year-old woman, Gloria MacKenzie, won the prize emphatically. When she bought the winning ticket, the person in front of her let MacKenzie go ahead and buy her ticket first out of good will. That act of kindness on the stranger’s part turned out to be quite a big one for MacKenzie.

Unbearable Losses

Then there are the losses in the game of gambling. Back in 2014, a 27-year-old man named Ryan Myers from Liverpool hanged himself after a very bad run of luck when it came to gambling. The fact of the matter was that he was a proper gambling addict who could not control his impulse to want to gamble. His inability to let go of slot machines and continual gambling habits made him go into a loss of thousands of pounds worth of debts.

The man committed suicide because he felt that he had completely lost control over himself and could no longer bear the shame of the debt that he had accumulated. He never made the problem that he had apparent to his family who did not even see it coming. They even had a good laugh with him when they were on vacation just a few months prior to his passing away when they were in Turkey. It was only after his death hat his family found the full extent of the gambling problem that Myers had and the debt that he was in.

One Man’s Gain Is Another Man’s Loss

Millions of people all around the world gamble their money in all different forms of gambling. There are those who do it just for the sake of passing their time, there are those who gamble for the sake of making a lot of money and then there are those who do it just for the sake of the thrill. Most of the people that gamble are those who cannot afford to lose a lot – the old and the poor. Regardless, it is something that’s being done all around the world. The government of the US was always strongly in opposition of gambling. It was outlawed completely in the country at one point but now it is a huge industry and the government also profits from it in various different forms.

There are pros and cons to everything. Here’s a brief look at the pros and cons of gambling which will help you decide whether or not gambling is for you.

Pros of Gambling

While there are plenty of pros to consider, for the sake of talking about a few, we will discuss the most prominent ones.

The possibility of winning big and making a lot of money is the most appealing aspect of gambling.

The fact that anybody can win is another more appealing factor that works in favor of gambling. It’s based on chance.

It’s quite accessible. From the traditional physical casinos to games that can be played online through desktop computers and smartphones, gambling games are now available in various different forms.

There are so many different forms of gambling. There are those games that are based purely on chance while there are those that do require a certain bit of skill to go along with the chance.

Cons of Gambling

Then there are the cons that have to be considered. Again, there are plenty of possible cons but here are the most pertinent.

The possibility of losing money is much higher than the possibility to take home big winnings. No matter how good your run of luck is, if you stay in gambling for a long term, you will lose.

Winning is never a consistent thing when it comes to gambling. Even in gambling games that require skill along with chance, it is impossible to consistently win. Hence the fact that gambling is what it is.

Gambling is not at all something that is seen as respectable. There are always other more respectable ways to earn money, and depending on uncertainty and odds does not look good when it comes to securing income.

The worst part of gambling is the addiction that it can become. The example given above is a clear example of how bad things can get when you are addicted to gambling and cannot control yourself.

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